


What The Dragon

by WoozySloth



Category: Dragon Ball
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Tragedy, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Genetic Engineering, Implied/Referenced Brainwashing, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Mad Science, Necromancy, Parenthood, Time Travel, What-If
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-30
Updated: 2020-07-14
Packaged: 2021-02-27 15:54:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 17,038
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22019728
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WoozySloth/pseuds/WoozySloth
Summary: A smattering of what-if scenarios, including Fearless Yamcha, Bulma Doing Gero's Schtick Better Than Gero, and Chi-Chi Yelling At God. Among others.
Comments: 12
Kudos: 28





	1. Piccolo Goes Camping

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Piccolo and 17 get to finish their fight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> These events take place during Chapter 367 (DBZ 173) or Episodes 148/149

_Inevitable._

That was one of the main advantages, if not _the_ main advantage, of models Seventeen and Eighteen. Brute force was all well and good. Durability, undoubtedly a necessary feature for the task at hand. But inevitability was their real weapon. Strong as they were, the good Doctor Gero had studied enough of Son Goku's battles to conclude that there would be some completely out-of-nowhere power, technique or turn of fortune that would buoy the hateful alien to victory.

If, that is, 'victory' could be attained in a contest of pure strength and skill. These weapons, however, were designed not only to beat Goku, but to outlast him should he somehow prove strong enough to compete. To be undefeatable not only because of their overwhelming power, but because that power would never waver, tire, decrease, be blunted, be in any way stopped or stoppered. An infinite supply of energy, technology that could have changed the course of history on an unprecedented scale. All to kill this one being.

Not, Seventeen noted, the being in front of him right now. Not directly.

No, at this point, killing Piccolo was a personal matter. The demon, or alien, whatever he (was he even a 'he'?) was, had proven himself to be uniquely irritating. The last time he had encountered this 'fighter', the green man hadn't even registered as a threat - yet over the course of what had been started as a mildly entertaining sidequest, Seventeen had been knocked back, down and around the whole of this island, and had at one point almost been permanently taken out of commission.

Now the smirking slug-person was standing there, panting, bleeding (not nearly enough) but still making out like he was going to take Seventeen down. Like Seventeen was some mid-level threat, some mook that he was taking care of so Goku didn't have to waste his time.

That. Was irksome.

Almost as irksome as his sister offering to 'tag in' and finish the job, or even take the green man down together. Who did she think she was? Who did she think _he_ was?

Whatever. Seventeen would get back in the game, take a few lumps from this surprisingly hardy nuisance, then finish off the former 'demon king' once the guy had tuckered himself out trying to compete with a neverending supply of energy.

Simple. Straightforward. Inevitable.

And kind of boring.

Still, that was the plan. At least until Piccolo got that funny look on his face, like he'd just heard something strange that Seventeen wasn't privy to. Which, with those big ears, could easily be the case. Piccolo smiled, abandoning his battle stance and straightening into a more casual posture.

"Heh."

Seventeen frowned - it was a good thing, he thought, that he was immune to wrinkles, otherwise this whole fight would have been hell on his complexion.

...secure as he was, he could never let his sister be privy to that thought.

"Something funny?"

Piccolo - or whoever this guy was, because he'd thrown any Piccolo-related data completely off - smirked.

"Congratulations. You and your gang have retaken your place as the most powerful of Gero's creations."

"Never off of it, big guy. The doctor might have been a genius," here, Seventeen clenched a fist, a gesture that could have turned a lump of coal into a diamond if he'd felt like it, "but you can't improve on perfection. That's me, by the way - perfection."

"Hmph. A jumped-up juvenile delinquent without a notion of how to apply your unearned power. The creature I met would have devoured you whole and turned your aimless energy to something worth fearing. With it gone, I can finally relax, and enjoy my victory."

Seventeen swore he could feel his internal machinery overheating. He could _taste_ his own rage.

"You haven't won. You won't."

The green... _insect_ was picking at one fang, which given that he didn't even eat anything was almost certainly just to further enrage his opponent.

It was working.

"I think we can both see how this battle is going - surely Gero gave you enough intelligence to recognise a losing battle. Your defeat is inevitable, machine."

"Bluffing or not, you're delusional. What's 'inevitable' is that you're going to get weaker, while I stay at the top of my game. Whatever technique, or plan, or ally that you're planning to call on, _it won't work._ I have literally infinite power. I _am_ power."

"What you _are_ is a collection of nuts and bolts that thinks itself a warrior."

Seventeen started to float.

"I think it's time I demonstrated what you're up against."

He went higher and higher. If he expected to bait Piccolo into an attack, he would be sorely disappointed - all his opponent did was watch his ascent.

Energy started to gather in Seventeen's palms.

If there was one strategy that was also afforded him and his sister by their unique construction, this one stood out as the major alternative to simply outlasting their opponent.

The artificial ki sparked and crackled in his hands.

On a remote island in the southern sea, it rained death.

* * *

Seventeen could admit that he'd partially stolen this move from his opponent. In his defense, it had been really, really cool - even as it threatened to end his life.

The problem was, although he was designed (successfully, he might add) to be the ultimate fighter, he was having difficulty getting the specifics of the move. Try as he might, controlling the blasts after he fired them was proving exceptionally difficult. He thought it might be related to his inability to sense ki, which honestly seemed like more of a design flaw the longer he spent out in the world. Or it could be the sheer volume of blasts.

There were a lot of blasts - he could barely see his enemy through the sheets of light he was sending down, despite his enhanced eyesight. A blur of green, ducking and dodging between the beams. Seventeen poured it on even harder. In another lifetime this kind of 'technique', such as it was, could have easily handled any and all of Earth's finest warriors - right up to Piccolo's own student, beaten and helpless on the ground as his surroundings burned and shattered.

But for the Seventeen of this time and place, highly advanced subconscious calculations were telling him that as things were going, Piccolo could theoretically keep dodging until the sun went cold.

That was when the artificial man decided to get innovative - he couldn't control the blasts too well after he sent them down - but he could mould them before that.

He wasn't used to putting in an effort like this. Hell, he wasn't sure he was _designed_ to feel like he was making an effort at all. As he began to enact the necessary changes, there was room for only one idle thought.

_'This better be worth it.'_

* * *

Down below, Piccolo noticed the frequency of the blasts increasing, which was only giving him more time to plan his next move - he didn't want to admit it, but he had been worried that purposefully inciting an incredibly empowered young man who considered himself exempt from society's rules might have been a bad move.

As he noticed the blasts getting smaller, he thought that perhaps the 'infinite' aspect of Seventeen and Eighteen's powers might have been exaggerated.

When it became apparent that the blasts were increasing in frequency as they decreased in size, regret began to seem like the right reaction after all. Gradually, easily avoided glowing orbs of light became thousands of barely visible bullets. He could only see them by 'virtue' of their being the only thing around - it seemed unlikely there was even room for air between the bug-sized, stinging blasts. Despite himself, he had to admit he was impressed. As it stood, he would either have to flee the scene at speed, or devise a truly stunning plan.

Piccolo had the combined intellect, skill and power of...several different Namekians. It was hard to keep track when, by some reckonings, two of those components were actually half of a singularly powerful being, or a descendant or reincarnation of one of those halves.

He would be the first to say that his was a curious sort of existence. But all of those pieces added up (he hoped) to someone who could survive this truly ridiculous onslaught. As the energy sparked and exploded around him and on him, the Namek enacted a plan. In the several hundreds of years of material he had to draw on, it was actually only a very short period that he was using, inspiration taken from the humans and Saiyans he had fought with (in the multiple different meanings of that phrase) in several different forms - in that it was insane, impractical, ridiculously dangerous and almost completely made up on the fly.

These people were contagious.

* * *

_He could barely see through the storm of bullets, couldn't hear over the sound of stone splitting and shattering under the assault - **his** assault._

_Controlling the spray was a pain, but it was worth it for the result - a giant '17' emblazoned on the bank wall for all to see. His sister, uncultured as she was, didn't seem to appreciate his artistic efforts._

_"Idiot. Get in the car."_

_Truly, he was ahead of his time._

_Bags stuffed full of their ill-gotten gains, the siblings jumped in the back of the van, one less willingly than the other._

_"_ _My ear!"_

_"Suck it up."_

_"_ _What are you, my mother?"_

_She snorted at that, not deigning to continue their banter. Their redheaded getaway driver had duly started accelerating, face unchanged despite their approaching a pleasingly dangerous velocity, or the screams, shouts and sirens that pierced the air around them._

_They outpaced all the chaos with disappointing ease, leaving a silence that suited his two companions a lot more than it did himself._

_"_ _...you know, I could drive."_

_The driver, who might have been offended by that but sounded and looked completely devoid of any kind of emotion, spoke up._

_"_ _The getaway driver should be separate from the operation inside the bank, for the sake of efficiency as well as some level of insurance."_

_"He's not saying you're an idiot, but I am. You're an idiot," his sister chimed in helpfully._

_He distinctly was **not** pouting the rest of the ride to the base, whatever anyone said._

_Gero was waiting for them, suited up in the tailored Red Ribbon style they all adhered to - sharp pinstriped suits - grey if you didn't have a Colour rank - with a red ribbon brim on the hat. The 'RR' emblazoned on the breast of the suit seemed to shine brighter for 'Doctor' Gero, as if trying to match the intense fervour in his eyes._

_For all the flourish that the money was dumped at his feet, the good doctor's face was distinctly unimpressed._

_"What do you think you're doing?"_

_"Uh, handing over the loot? You go senile while we were away?"_

_"I see. And where did you obtain this 'loot' from?"_

_Lapis stared at his boss, who was usually a different kind of crazy than he was presenting at the moment._

_"From a bank? That I - we," he corrected himself, in case Lazuli took offence, "robbed. Wait, are you wearing a wire?"_

_"And how did you rob this bank?"_

_"Seriously, are you wear-"_

_"Answer the question, Number Seventeen."_

_"_ _Number...nevermind. I used this," Lapis waved his tommy gun around in the air, hoping that might scare the old man out of this weird psychosis he was in._

_"A gun. Rather than, say, artificially enhanced ki blasts derived from your innate energy in conjunction with the most advanced power source in existence?"_

_Lapis didn't have anything for that mess. He just stared._

_This seemed to finally provoke a reaction, as the doctor pinched the bridge of his nose, eyes closed._

_"_ _You are an idiot," Gero pronounced._

_"_ _So I've heard," Sevent - Lapis growled, "but I'm an idiot with a gun."_

"Y _ou've overheated."_

_Lapis frowned - the gun was still pretty hot, sure - he could see steam coming off the barrel- but it would do the job, which this old loon would find out pretty quickly if he kept annoying a superior warrior._

_...gangster. A superior gangster. Whatever ranks they held or modifications they'd undergone, Lapinteen - **Lapis -** was twice the man that Gero would ever be. He'd proved it when he'd crushed the other android's head under his foot._

_._. _.Wait, what?_

_"_ _You're...making my head hurt, old man. Better," Lapis gasped, as the world itself seemed to waver around him, "better... **stop**. Before I - "_

_"Aside from your power core, and a truly impressive self-destruct device, you actually have minimal mechanical parts involved in your construction. In fact, you are mostly some rather ingeniously reworked biology."_

_"Wouldn't that make me more of a cyborg than an an -" Seventeen stopped, looking down at his hands, "android."_

_"Hmm. Technically, I termed all my creations 'Artificial Humans' and your sister would be a gynoid regardless, but yes, you could make that argument. You are mostly called 'androids' for a sort of shorthand. Indeed, perhaps cyborg is a more accurate term. Which leads us to my main point - Your power source is infinite, but as the Demon King has demonstrated quite aptly, your body is not invulnerable - it cannot yet handle the physical strain you have placed on it. On top of that, the mental strain of coordinating and shaping so much energy, well,"_ _Gero waved a hand at their surroundings, vague as they were becoming, "We can see what has happened there, can't we?"_

_"Alright. So if **you're** such a genius, tell me - how do I get out of this?"_

_Gero fixed him with a dead stare._

_"Stop firing."_

_"..."_

_"..."_

* * *

"Oh."

There was a great deal of steam around him, such that he thought he might still be hallucinating, but looking down confirmed the source.

If there was any island left under all that steam, it was undoubtedly in several very small pieces.

"Do you think you got him?"

Seventeen did _not_ jump - for one, he was still floating in the air, so it would have been impossible to define it as a 'jump'. He was just adjusting his altitude a little.

"Jealous?"

Eighteen rolled her eyes, "Of what, the gloves you're going to be buying?"

What?

Eighteen indicated his hands, which, okay, wow, that _was_ pretty nasty.

"Well, hey, scars are cool, right?"

"When they don't look like a bad rash."

"Whatever. I'll get some sweet leather gloves after we kill Goku. Or before, y'know, big event. I'm thinking maybe fingerless?"

"If I could still throw up, I would."

" _Can_ we throw up?"

Eighteen shrugged.

"Hey big guy, got a question for you!" Seventeen shouted at their third party member, who was a little ways away staring at...something.

"He is still alive."

Seventeen looked at the larger android. Looked at the cloud of steam that used to be an island. Looked at his pockmarked hands and what he could swear was steam coming off of _them._ Looked back at Sixteen.

"You're messing with me."

"No."

"Alright. Alright," Seventeen sighed, because yeah, this guy was getting annoying, "man, it's like a bad children's book. Where's Piccolo?"

"It is not Piccolo."

"You know what I - Where's the guy who _looks_ like Piccolo then?"

Strangely enough, those heavy brows seemed to be furrowed even deeper than usual.

"He is obscuring his energy somehow. It appears as if he is covering a wider area than possible, but I do not think he would use his gigantification technique under these circumstances."

"Well, if it's _not_ Piccolo, maybe he's going to do something that Piccolo wouldn't."

"Look," his sister interrupted, "let's just get out of here. Whoever he is, he'd be an idiot to try and keep fighting - even by the standards of Goku's posse."

"Posse?"

"Gang, team, nakama, whatever. We go back to the old guy's place, knock some heads, get Goku's location out of them, kill Goku, then _move on_. I've been over this whole thing since before I woke up, I swear."

Seventeen shrugged, "Yeah, whatever. At least I won."

"Whatever gets you moving."

"Hey, come on, this is a win for me."

"Mmmm. Draw."

"No, no, that's bull! Just say that I won."

"Look," said Sixteen, nodding at where the island had been.

Seventeen saw that the steam was clearing, exposing little patches of green. Must have been some hardy plants on that island if they could survive that. He was almost impressed. Go plants.

Except, as the mist moved on, the green became clearer. The shape of it was awfully familiar - it had hit him in the face enough times. But unless he had messed up his sense of perspective, there was a pretty notable difference.

"Guess he did get all big green on us, huh?"

You couldn't miss it - a giant green arm floating in the ocean.

"Why?" 

Sixteen answered, "It contains his energy - he is using it as a decoy, perhaps to cover his escape. He may also have used it as a shield against your attack."

"Grew his arm for cover and then ripped it off to cover his tracks? Huh. Guy's hardcore, I'll give him that."

"Guy's disgusting. Seriously, all that when he could have just run away in the first place?" Eighteen shook her head. "I don't understand these people."

"Yeah, well, I still have all my limbs, so, win for me." He grinned victoriously, stretching his arms up to the sky - he wasn't sure if he could feel 'tired' as such, but he did feel pretty battered. Maybe they could hit up a spa after they killed Goku? It wasn't his usual style, but surely he deserved some R&R after they completed their little game.

Seventeen winced - he must have pulled a muscle or something, because that stretch had hit his abdomen something fierce. There was a heat blooming in his torso that he wasn't expecting - seriously, could he even pull muscles? He wasn't sure who to be more annoyed with - Gero for leaving that 'feature' in, or Piccolo for forcing him to discover it.

"Seventeen!" 

Opening his eyes, he saw the most curious thing. There was this twisting beam of light, shooting off into the sky. It reminded him of something, nagging at the back of his mind.

_The light drilled through both Saiyans with ease, both outstripping Subject Daimao2 in power. Possible threat? Analysis: Long charge time, unwieldy aim due to comparatively thin size of blast. Unlikely factor in unassisted combat scenario. Artificial Human #17 is too fast to be defeated by this technique, unless somehow caught unawares. Even should it make contact, the anticipated vast power disparity..._

_'_ _Oh, wow.'_

_'_ _Oh, you really got it wrong old man.'_

Seventeen watched the beam spiral off into the distance, way off into the bright blue sky.

It was kind of pretty, he decided.

_'And here I thought - '_

_May 9, Age 753. Subject Daimao broadcast to known world. Command that all persons should commit crime wantonly. Declaration of abolishment of the rule of law. Declaration that one city be destroyed each year by Subject Daimao, at random._

_'I really , really thought - '_

_November 3, Age 762. Subject Daimao2 interposing own body between blast and Subject SG2, at cost of own life._

_'_ _That you had gone soft.'_

_Darkness - the time of day and location in the world does not account for darkness._

_'Seriously. What a cheap shot.'_

"Seventeen!"

_'I'm kind of...'_

"La-!"

_'Impressed.'_


	2. A Harmless Wish

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Even a seemingly mundane wish should be worded carefully - in which the Eternal Dragon is also a jackass genie, through the power of miscommunication

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As short as I make these, this one legitimately ended before I intended it to. I was just looking at my screen with this weird 'huh' feeling. I suppose it's a good thing, then, that I' decided 'unfinished' was their more-or-less defining feature already. There's a brief dive into the far-reaching consequences of what would be a full story in it, because totally chronological storytelling is my kryptonite, apparently.
> 
> Also, I'm gonna try make the next one a bit more balanced gender-wise, cause that's one thing I'll always give Toriyama stick for and yet I'm not really doing any better here. Rambling. Do read the actual thing, please and thank you.

It wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that Puar lived for Yamcha. Camped out in the Diablo Desert, a desolate wasteland that made other desolate wastelands look cushy, true companionship and trust were as rare and precious as water.

So what if Yamcha's wish was a little...silly? It only sounded that way to other people because they didn't know how much the young bandit had been hampered by his phobia - someone with his talents, wasting away, scavenging from others? It was criminal.

Literally it was criminal. Enjoyable as daring banditry could be, it was still something that they'd been forced into by a severe case of gynophobia.

For such a dear friend, who so desperately wanted to just _fix_ this debilitating weakness, Puar would go above and beyond. Would not even think of the limitless power that this 'wish' was capable of, the vast riches it could grant, even if there was time to think of such things (there wasn't, by the way - a tiny blue manchild madman was about to give himself the Earth).

That's why the wish that was shouted was Yamcha's wish. 

Or close enough.

* * *

"Sooo, how do you feel?"

Yamcha poked at the chipped tooth that had, in some ways, started this whole thing. As embarrassed as he'd been to publicly lose to a small (freakishly strong) child because of his shameful fear, the chip in his tooth was what had really fueled his initial pursuit. It might have taken him this far even without the promise of a cure for his 'condition'.

Vanity was not one of his more admirable traits, he knew that, but his looks were one of the very few things he had in the life he led.

"Not much different, I guess." He would have been more careful about showing off the tooth, he thought, but that was a pretty minor adjustment for a wish from a giant dragon. "To be honest, I think I was kind of over it anyway."

"Huh. And why would that be?" Bulma was making a show of being coy - she had to know why.

"I guess...working with you? If you can call it that," was he going to make a joke? To an attractive girl his age? "Maybe I should put you down as a reference?" Huh. Guess he was. He would have thought that would be harder. Also funnier, but there was only so much an Eternal Dragon could do.

Bulma laughed anyway. It made him feel good, to hear her laugh. To have made her laugh.

Maybe this wasn't such a wasted wish after all?

* * *

They broke up about two weeks after they arrived in West City.

"Jerk!"

It was actually a reasonably good training tool - though even he wouldn't have said so just then. Who knew Bulma could throw so many pieces of machinery so rapidly?

"Look, you don't seem all that happy with me..."

"Oh, _really_? Whatever gave you," a surprisingly hefty microscope came flying at a particularly sensitive area, " _that_ idea?"

He slid it onto a nearby table that he'd had to put back on its legs earlier. Most of the challenge was actually in rerouting this expensive stuff to a safer place instead of purely dodging, which would be letting it get damaged. He wasn't completely inconsiderate.

"I mean in general - I just, y'know, don't seem to be what you're looking for in a boyfriend." He wasn't even sure what it was that came flying at his head next - it was mostly spherical, but it also had tiny legs that he couldn't see the point of. Some sort of robot? "Really, this seems like the best thing for both of us."

"Oh, how considerate!" Another microscope, only it blinked at him when he touched it. "How _noble!_ " A miniature flying car that had been cracked open to get a better look at the insides.

"Look, obviously I'm unhappy too - " What could she possibly have in her pocket? Was she going to throw change at him? He'd heard of a martial arts (or martial arts adjacent) technique where you could flick special coins with your thumb so fast that they might as well be bullets, but unless he'd missed something significant in their time together...

Oh it was a capsule.

As what seemed to be the hybrid offspring of a tank and a camper van materialised above his head, Yamcha still didn't particularly regret his decision. He felt vaguely sad, yes, but it ultimately seemed to be the right move. Honestly, he was kind of impressed with himself - he couldn't have imagined doing anything like this. The concept alone would have baffled him completely. It still sort of did. Could he even say he was the same man he had been?

He sighed as he stretched his arms out to catch the thing, grunting under the strain. For all the power that had gone into making him this way, apparently romance still wasn't his strong suit. Not that he was going back to the desert, of course, but it didn't seem like West City was the place for him right now. Perhaps it was time to focus on a different dream.

Where was that island Goku had gone to supposed to be?

* * *

"Damn."

Krillin looked up with a certain laziness, born of hearing many exclamations of disappointment over, say, an 'unfortunately' placed bit of foliage in a certain kind of photo shoot. Or perhaps his venerable master (and he did respect him, really, but...well) had spilled some beer on his shirt - he'd had enough by now that it wasn't terribly unexpected.

Instead, he found that those familiar sunglasses were turned up towards the sky, and the frown on the master's face suggested more serious matters.

"What is it Master?"

The old Turtle Hermit sipped his beer, though it seemed like he wasn't taking any more joy in it.

"He's coming."

Was it a contractual thing, that all elders in the martial arts community had to be so vague about everything. Krillin suppressed a sigh, trying to figure out who his master could mean. It wasn't Goku - they were all looking forward to their friend's arrival. That was a big reason they were even holding this get-together. It certainly wasn't Piccolo, though the possibility put a bolt of fear through his spine. If it were, they would already be gone from this island, or Roshi would have smacked him over the head with a particularly hefty magazine and demanded they ready themselves for battle (read: a glorified holding action for Goku).

So that left...

"Oh. Dibs on not telling Bulma."

Roshi snorted, seemingly amused. Hopefully that meant he himself wasn't too upset about the whole thing.

"You should have sensed him coming, you know. He's..." here the old master worked his mouth a bit, as if displeased at the feeling of the word about to come out, " _flying."_

Aware of his own sins in that regard, Krillin tried to amend at least one deficiency he'd demonstrated, stretching out his senses. The power he found there had grown significantly since the last time he'd touched on it.

"Huh. Guess it's true what they say on TV," Krillin got up to get his own beer, readying himself for the inevitable storm, though right then he thought perhaps it might 'merely' be one of harsh words. "Prison really _is_ a good place to work out."

* * *

The Turtle Hermit - 'Master Roshi' to friends and lady-friends especially - made his way through the crowd carefully. He even abstained from some prime pinching opportunities as he went along, since that might cause a commotion. People got so heated about things nowadays, how was an old-timer like himself supposed to have any fun? But there it was, if he wanted to disguise himself in any sort of peace, forgoing some of life's simpler pleasures was a necessity.

This _was_ a necessity. As it stood, unless someone came out of the woodwork, or Crane had entered some of his would-be assassins into a proper martial arts tournament, his boys were fit to take the whole thing by storm. The effect on their egos would be catastrophic, their potential strangled by their own overconfidence. Hell, the latecomer among them already had a bit of a problem in that regard.

Not that he didn't like the boy. Truthfully, it was kind of hard to dislike him. That seemingly unassailable confidence made the oldest of his students refreshing company. It wasn't as brash as Krillin's insecurity-born boastfulness, and while it was more similar to the straightforward and uncomplicated mindset of his other student, Yamcha still had a bit of worldliness about him. No wonder, given his past - Roshi had been hesitant to take in a criminal (that wasn't also a smoking babe with extenuating circumstances, that is), but Goku had vouched for him - apparently the older boy had been pretty vital in saving their world from a pretty drastic political upset.

He wasn't a bad kid, the old hermit thought as he spotted the local police walking by with a picture of the kid in question. So he wouldn't rat him out.

Fortunately or unfortunately, they were unlikely to identify the young man in the photo with anyone competing in the tournament.

* * *

Yamcha knew his shapeshifting friend was prone to tears. It was actually one of the things he liked about Puar - that willingness to show emotion was its own special kind of bravery. But this seemed like something of an overreaction.

"Puar, it's only hair."

"It's _your_ hair, Lord Yamcha," Puar hiccuped through sobs, "your glorious mane!"

He hoped it wasn't cruel to chuckle, the sound hidden by the buzzing of the electric shaver. Krillin had made a compelling point for some shearing coming up to the tournament. A point made with several vicious hair grabs during a spar - they'd only recently had enough energy for further exercise on top of their chores and studies (and afternoon naps. The Turtle Hermit knew how to live), but Yamcha had definitely gotten the impression the little bald monk had been waiting to use the luscious black locks against him.

He picked the still sniffling Puar up in his arms, intending to get them both a snack in celebration of/consolation for his new 'do, not expecting the blinding flash of light that awaited him at the bottom of the stairs. Or the laughter.

Krillin was busy laughing himself sick, along with Goku, but the Master and Launch - who was tittering herself, despite being in 'good' mode - managed to explain that no, the Master did _not_ shave his head for martial reasons, and also why hadn't he just settled on getting a particularly short haircut if he was that worried about it?

Yamcha had to admit he probably should have done that, as he got a good look at the developed photograph.

Complimented by the the upset Puar in his arms, Yamcha's pate was on full display, along with his cracked tooth (oh, Bulma had made him an appointment for that, hadn't she? He'd missed it), courtesy of a particularly gormless expression.

"My boy," the Turtle Hermit inquired with a laugh of his own, "you couldn't have shaved in some other areas as well?" Thankfully he indicated his chin.

On closer inspection, yes, Yamcha did have some rather embarrassingly underdeveloped hair follicles poking out here and there, where an older man might have something approaching a respectable amount of facial hair.

It was, undoubtedly, the worst he had ever looked. 

Yamcha threw back his head and laughed.

* * *

"Haven't seen him Officer."

The guard looked at the picture - a handsome, cocky youth with a shaggy yet well-conditioned mane, clean-shaven and well-groomed overall. Athletic and muscular, certainly, but not anything like the definition on this bald, badly groomed young man with his open, cracked smile.

He could be forgiven for not making any sort of connection between the two.

"Very well - if you do see him, or anyone bearing a resemblance to this individual, please report it immediately. The sponsors have warned us to be on high alert."

"Sponsors?"

The guard looked at him like he was dim, which Yamcha thought was a bit rich given the situation. Then the guy jerked his head up a bit, where - if you cared to look up - you could clearly see...

An absolutely gigantic Capsule Corp. logo.

Yamcha whistled.

That girl really knew how to hold a grudge.

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I forgot to add that 17's nameless onslaught in the last chapter bears a lot of similarities to a technique that shows up in "The Optimised Wish Project" by Gan_HOPE326, which is a great ongoing rational fic of Dragon Ball, something I might have legitimately told you was impossible to do well before - I'm a big fan of the absurd, in DB and in general, so I'm surprised by how into this fic I am.
> 
> Speaking of inspiration/outright theft, the idea that the Turtle Hermit would be disgusted by his students learning to fly is not only from his description of it as a 'gimmick' in canon, but was actually enacted by unnoun in "(On Planet Earth)", in what I thought was a great expansion on canon information. On Earth, before everybody picks it up, flight is the signature of the Crane School, rivals to Roshi's own style. It's also prominently used by Piccolo Daimao's clan - he's not particularly fond of them either.
> 
> On the subject of the Turtle Hermit, I find him tricky to write because, while it originates from a gag manga, and I do love the old lech, that is what he is - a lech. It's not exactly an admirable character trait.
> 
> On the subject of unnoun, you should also check out "A Spring Mother and Her Baby Carrot", which is something I often feel is personally impossible for me - an interesting what-if concept expanded into an actual, sequential story. Same as above, there's that present but not overpowering worldbuilding I'm a sucker for as well.


	3. Mad Science for the Post-Apocalyptic Single Mother

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Not so much a "What if?" as a "Then What?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Regularity? Where we're going we don't need...regularity.

The cruellest thing, Bulma thought, was how his hair kept growing. It wasn't supposed to work that way at all - what happened was that the skin dehydrated, pulled back, and so the hair and fingernails only appeared to get longer. But whether it was a quirk of Saiyan DNA, Human-Saiyan DNA, or the solution he was in, Trunks' hair just kept on getting longer. She'd catch a glimpse of it out the corner of her eye, then jump and gasp and check the computers and ask the Androids and...

She kept doing the same thing, every time, no matter how pathetic it made her feel.

Every change, every scrap of progress, no matter how infinitesimally small, got a similar reaction. She was making him breathe by pumping oxygen into his lungs, making his heart beat with the aid of small mechanical drones - originally built for spying, now repurposed into tiny medical assistants like their bigger, humanoid, death-machine brethren. She knew, intellectually, it was all her, that nothing mattered but the lines she couldn't force with mere machinery. The all-important brainwaves.

He'd been such a clever boy, really. Obviously, since he'd come out of _the_ Bulma, Science-Adventurer Extraordinaire. Gohan had taught him more than fighting too, having adopted a little bit of his mother's philosophy - what was the point of only training a child to fight, when the goal was a future where they didn't have to? He'd been good to them, Goku's awkward little boy turned stalwart, doomed defender. Had instilled a sense of justice and duty in her boy (that had gotten him killed, a traitorous part of her thought), had taught him how to throw a punch and fly, but also how to hope. Trunks had brought his teacher home any number of times, beaten and bloodied, and then watched him rise up and head out again. And again. And again.

Until he couldn't anymore.

The last time, Bulma had thought her heart would break. That sweet little boy, her spacefaring companion, the last connection to the old fighters. It was too much.

Then...

_Mom, go inside._

_Ohohoho, I'm not falling for that! Where is she Trunks?_

_Mom._

It was supposed to be over. They'd found the lab. They'd turned those living nightmares off for good. But they hadn't been thorough enough. Had been so caught up with finding a way to end it all, they hadn't thought to check whether there could be something worse waiting in the wings.

Didn't matter. When she went back, she'd found everything she needed. The thing that had killed her boy and stolen the means to bring him back...it had been born here. The other creatures, the weapons that had been built to kill her friends, they would help, and so would the science that had taken Trunks from her.

_19, take his energy!_

_The doll-man grabbed her son's arm with a cruel smile. Trunks didn't seem to notice - he was staring, studying a face he had only seen in pictures but hated with everything he had._

_"You...this is all YOUR fault!"_

_Golden light had enveloped him, coursed through his being - and right up the arm of the white android, whose artificial countenance contorted in shock and fear as Trunks' power suddenly spiked and flooded its system._

It had taken her a while to fix the doctor's assistant after what Trunks had done to it. Gero himself - or Android 20 - was unrecoverable. Sometimes she'd wondered how her and Vegeta had managed to produce such a sweet-tempered boy, but every once in a while she saw a bit of herself, or the murderous space pirate, in her son's actions.

19 and 16 had proven to be pretty invaluable help. They both had a decent idea of both what Gero had done regarding his biological creations, or where to find any information they didn't have. 16 had been an interesting find - without Goku's presence, and a little bit of rewiring, he was a docile and helpful creature, strangely gentle in manner. She'd asked him once why he was created to be so passive and - 

"His son?"

Sometimes, it disgusted her how much _sense_ Gero made. But she wasn't content with a facsimile, a doll made up to look like what she'd lost. She wanted the real thing, and if Dragon Balls and time travel weren't options, she'd just make it happen her damn self.

The Androids, or cyborgs, whatever they really were, they'd done a number on the lab where their replacement was being grown (seriously, a secret lab _inside_ your secret lab. Crazy old monster), but there had been enough information and enough material for her to work from.

The material was something else. She'd found old King Piccolo, Freeza, his father, even Goku's brother, all of them cut up or frozen or floating in jars. There were obsessive notes and recordings of basically everything Goku and anyone even remotely connected to him had done between the fall of the Red Ribbon Army and the man's death. She'd watch the old fights and talk to Trunks about them, using the technology Gero taught his creature with to let Trunks 'watch' with her. She would play old home videos in his head the same way, or 'linked' to bits of info she thought were funny.

Well, except for how Gero had recovered Freeza's body. Goku had buried the alien warlord/real estate agent in the spot where he'd killed him, because Goku being Goku, he hadn't really wanted or meant to kill the guy. Vegeta, she discovered from going through the records, had come back to the spot later, dug his old boss up and...well.

It still made her laugh.

After the Prince of All Saiyans had finished 'paying his respects', he'd left the body out for the local wildlife, which made it easy to recover. It actually could have had some pretty disastrous effects if Gero hadn't been such a ghoul - consuming Freeza's flesh, it turned out, made for some pretty extreme nutrition. 

Which was why she was grafting it onto her son's internal organs, of course. She left that out when she talked to him, to. If Freeza's species could survive the vacuum of space, then she wanted some of that insane durability for Trunks. As Gero had realised, combining this trait with the regenerative abilities of the Namekians would make for something invincible. Something that might potentially even be immortal.

She wondered how Vegeta would feel, that she was giving his wish to their son. Probably he'd unreasonably offended, both that she hadn't expended the effort for him, and that his proud Saiyan blood was getting a little bit sidelined, or that she'd reworked the gifts he had 'given' Trunks with the same technology that had killed him. Whatever.

She'd recreated the 'natal' solution that the creature Cell had been grown in, with a little bit of guesswork based on various descriptions of the rejuvenation pods Freeza's army used. The designs Gero had used for collecting genetic samples worked just as well on his own creations, so she'd sent them out to places where the people had disappeared, more quietly than was 17 and 18's style.

It would work. It had to work.

There was a beep.

She stopped, absolutely still. That wasn't the heart monitor. She'd given each bit of kit its own distinct sound, both for practical reasons and in a vain attempt to protect her weakened heart.

_Beep._

Her boy. He was thinking. He was awake.

He was _alive._

* * *

It took everything she had to be patient, to make sure that he would be alright if she took him out.

She checked. The Androids checked. The computer checked. Again and again and again.

16 lifted him out once the vat had drained, cradling him like a fragile bird in huge arms meant to crush and kill.

His hair hadn't just gotten longer, but paler as well - where once it had been a pale lavender, it was now bone white. His skin too, had paled considerably, and was dotted here and there with tiny black spots she hadn't been able to see through the bubbling liquid he'd been inhabiting for...for however long it had been since she'd found him dead on their lawn.

Gently, she brushed the hair out of his eyes, which...they were still blue. When she'd first looked into them, they'd seemed to be her own eyes looking back at her - she'd spent enough time at the mirror to know. But now, whether it was how much paler he was or something else entirely, they seemed to glow, to be the iciest, bluest eyes she had ever seen outside of - of...

It didn't matter. All that mattered was what she saw in those eyes. All she needed was the glimmer of recognition, the spark of personality that was her son.

She looked deep, deep into his eyes.

Searching.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Seriously though, what went down in this timeline? This is the one Cell comes from in canon, though I reworked Trunks' death a bit to be similar to how Cell approaches the one we know from the show.
> 
> I was trying to do a Bulma-centric chapter before, but it just wasn't coming out. So here's my alternative effort.


	4. Mother Dragon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chi-Chi has done 'waiting around' before  
> She's not going to do it for her son

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I actually debated doing this as a 'quest' on spacebattles or wherever would have it, but I think the multitasking element, numbers, etc, would just be a bit much for me. So here's a version where I don't take input from anybody else, like the egotistical maniac I really am.
> 
> This would follow up from episode 8 of Dragon Ball Z, when Chi-Chi and the Ox-King rush to Kame House to give everyone an earful.

When Chi-Chi woke up, her first thought was that she was going to kick Krillin right where his nose ought to be.

She wasn't sure why that was the first thing she thought of. She'd been incredibly annoyed with him for some reason, but surely she had other things to think about?

"It's okay darlin'. It's alright." Her father sounded tired. Old. That was pretty strange - even in his 'demon' days he'd always been a jovial, energetic man. What could have gotten him so low?

Chi-Chi sat up, trying to remember why it was she had been lying on the ground. Had she fainted? That was unlike her, even if she could admit to herself that she could get a bit wound up about things. What had happened? And why was it just her father watching over, hadn't Goku been - 

Oh.

Right.

Goku was dead. Okay. That...wasn't great. But they had the Dragon Balls! So they could fix that! And then he could save Gohan from Piccolo. Because Piccolo had her baby. Had kidnapped her son.

"Um, Chi-Chi," and there was Krillin, tripping over his words the way he had back at her house, "I'm sorry, I didn't, you know."

"Dummy," Bulma chimed in, "seriously Krillin, you couldn't have told her instead of The Invincible Old Tact Master over here?"

The Invincible Master in question huffed.

"Girl, you're hardly in any position to talk about tact."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Bulma and Roshi started yelling at each other. Chi-Chi considered her options, such as they were. Alright. Gather the Dragon Balls. Wish her husband back to life. Team up with said husband to fight the demon that had taken their son. Give aforementioned husband an earful for getting killed, then shovel food into both him and Gohan until they were too full to do anything but sleep. All sleep in the same bed for a while. Great. Plan.

Chi-Chi went from lying prone on the sand to having her hands on Bulma's shoulders in less time than it took to blink - even the three accomplished and (in certain circles) feared martial artists in her presence would have been hard-pressed to follow her movement.

"Bulma!"

Bulma, who had been threatened by megalomaniacs with metal tentacles, giant beasts of all varieties, and a psychic General of a mercenary army, squeaked.

"Y-yes Chi-Chi?"

(Internally, because he wasn't stupid, Krillin was crowing about how Bulma had given him such a hard time about maybe being just a bit intimidated by Chi-Chi)

"Where's the gadget y'all used to look for Dragon Balls?"

"Uh, well..." Bulma looked to her left, at the three hundred and thirty-one year old master of martial arts who could blow up the moon and had trained some of the strongest men on the planet.

He was pretending to have something stuck in his ear. Or that he was too old to hear anything, one or the other.

She looked to her right, at the man who might as well have been Chi-Chi's brother-in-law, who had died once before, who had faced off against opponents many, many times his size and come out victorious, who was preparing to train to fight against opponents several times stronger than the strongest man any of them knew.

He was looking at some vague point out in the ocean.

_Men._

Bulma looked back Chi-Chi, then smiled, then decided smiling was not the best thing, then gathered her adventurer science-hero courage to herself.

"Uh, well. I can get the Dragon Radar, Chi-Chi. But we're not allowed to wish Goku back yet."

Chi-Chi's eyebrow twitched, and Bulma swore she saw death in that tiny movement.

"What?"  
  
Now Krillin chose to pipe up.

"Yaji-something said Goku had to do some special training in the afterlife - it's going to take the whole year until the Saiyans arrive, so he can be strong enough to fight them."

There was a moment of silence while everyone watched Chi-Chi process this information.

"Okay," was not the reaction they had expected, "okay. Goku has to train. Fine. We can get the Dragon Balls later. So instead, we need to get Yamcha, and Tenshinhan and, um, that little doll person."

"Well, yeah, that's what we were about to start doing," Krillin said, confused but slightly heartened at Chi-Chi's approving nod "how did you know?"

"Hmph. Well, it's obvious ain't it? Without Goku, it's going to take all of you working together to get my baby back from that monster."

As one, a single resounding thought went through every other mind on the island.

_Oh. Ohhhh no._

* * *

"He's _four."_

"Chi-Chi," the Ox-King began, knowing better than anyone that this the prelude to a truly monumental explosion, "I'm sure if the Master is allowing it, there must be a -"

"The 'Master' is a lech and a fool, and he let _your_ grandson get taken by the Demon King!" 

"Here now, girl," Roshi protested, "you try telling Piccolo what to do, see where it gets ya!"

"Well I'm telling ya to try something _now!_ You're all training up in the sky, my Goku's training in the afterlife. am I supposed to go get Gohan myself?" Chi-Chi's eyes gleamed. "Because if I have to, I _will._ "

"Chi-Chi, that's really not a good idea," Krillin said, "you've seen how strong Piccolo is..."

"Yup, when he beat my husband to an inch of his life and tried to kill us all. Or how he was the only strong enough to help Goku out with his brother, while his 'friends' stayed safe inside!"

Krillin flinched.

"Goku told us to -"

"And Goku died!"

The wind blew through the palm trees for a bit, until Chi-Chi spoke once again.

"Fine."

No one was sure what was 'fine' about any of this for Chi-Chi. That her husband was dead? That her son was in the clutches of his greatest enemy? It seemed unlikely that she was suddenly okay with all of that.

"Let's go the Lookout."

"Um," Bulma said, "what?"

"Let's get everybody, and we'll go the Lookout. Together."

"Uh, Chi-Chi, when Yagi-whatever delivered his message, it sounded like kind of an invitation only - "

"I do not. _Care._ "

And that was that.

* * *

The Ox-King had been having a hell of a day. Things had started out okay - yes, his daughter was a bit upset about the boys being out so late, but such things were bound to happen now and again, yes? Then it turned out that his son-in-law was dead (fixable, but still upsetting) and his precious grandson was in the clutches of a creature out of his childhood horror stories. He'd tried to show his master the proper deference - who could have stopped Piccolo Daimaio? As a former 'demon king' himself, he understood how people could just let themselves be trampled over in the face of something so far beyond them in strength and so terrifying in aspect. Perhaps, in some way, this whole thing was some sort of karmic backlash onto himself? His mountain had been blown up, true, and he had been extra-courteous in the years since his rampaging, but all in all he had never truly paid for being such a brute. That a real demon would come along and steal away someone he loved would be a harsh and poetic punishment indeed. Perhaps he could ask God about it.

If, that is, his baby girl would stop yelling at the Almighty for just a second.

"You're supposed to protect him, aren't ya?"

"I'm afraid it is my duty to protect *all* the people of this planet, and for that to happen -"

"Oh bull -!"

He would have maybe put a comforting or steadying hand on one of her shoulders, but the problem with that was that he was actually too weak to even stand - he'd climbed the Tower to get up here. That was something, anyway - he'd never even attempted it before, trying to lug his humongous body up the impossibly tall structure to meet the God of Martial Arts. Not that they'd had much in the way of a meeting - the white cat had given him some water and told him that his daughter was mightily impressive. If he hadn't been exhausted, he would have been proud. Then he'd had to inch up that magic toothpick of old Son Gohan's to get the rest of the way. So really, he would have liked to have stopped his daughter from yelling at the Guardian of Earth, but there just wasn't enough energy in his old giant's bones to do it.

Besides, the whole thing had been going on for a while by the time he got up there. Not only would the Lookout not allow them to hitch a ride on some mundane vehicle to get there (especially when they hadn't been invited), Chi-Chi had been unwilling to wait around for all of Earth's warriors to be collected, and so had just gone straight for the Land of Korin herself, quickly disappearing into the clouds as he tried to follow her. His heart had swelled with pride to see her outstrip him through youthful energy and strength and sheer force of will, even as a bead of exasperated sweat had rolled down his temple.

Chi-Chi had always been a talented little thing, even if her constitution had never been the best, emotionally speaking - prone to fits of shrieking and crying even as she, for example, handily decapitated a dinosaur. Her own fighting style little resembled his own, which Ox could admit to himself boiled down to being huge, strong, and pretty handy with an ax. She had developed, through the watching of other, more refined martial artists than himself, a style that was mostly quiet elegant in appearance - lots of knife hands and palms and high kicks and things he himself rarely bothered with. Like herself, it could sometimes appear quite dainty, while actually being backed up by a surprising amount of power and something of a native talent for spotting weaknesses.

"It's your fault Piccolo is even around to kidnap him!"

Yeah. Like that.

Even Tenshinhan winced at that one - Ox had been disinclined to like the boy on account of his being a Crane, but then the lad had stopped along with the other boys to talk to him, and politely offered a lift on finding out who he was. He'd refused of course, because to be a Turtle on the back of a Crane would have disgraced his master (and really, he thought to himself, what were Yamcha and Krillin doing flying around like that?), but it had been nice all the same. The other Crane, Chiaotzu, had helped him settle himself on the Lookout, and whispered that yes, his daughter had indeed been shouting at Kami ever since she had arrived, which had been some time ago even then.

"You just let that demon strut around and do whatever he wants, just waiting for someone else to come along and clean up _your_ mess, like you did the last time! Well all that evil that you coughed up has my son, and is gonna' to do who knows what with him for what, a year? And I'm supposed to be okay with that?"

"Piccolo is changing - "

"He kidnapped a toddler!"

"To train him."

"He doesn't need trainin'! He needs books, and toys, and a kiss on his forehead at night, and, and -"

They had called him ' _Gyūmaō' ,_ the Ox Demon King, not all that long ago, but still. Seeing how his daughter wavered, that fury just tipping over into despair, he could feel tears welling in his own eyes. She loved her son more than anything. He understood that better than anyone else on the Lookout, perhaps.

With a grunt of effort, the Ox-King forced his exhausted body to its feet. It was his greatest advantage in every fight he'd ever been in, but at the same time, it had stopped him from doing a great many things - moving this much mass when you'd just spent a few days climbing into the sky was no easy feat no matter how much he had trained. He moved in slow, thudding steps to his daughter's side. She looked up at him, exhausted and teary and more defiant than any living creature he knew, and he wrapped her up in his huge arms.

No one, not even Kami, dared say a word.

After a moment, she disengaged from him, wiped a hand across her eyes, and turned back to the Guardian.

"I didn't expect you to help. You ain't never done anythin' about Piccolo 'cept trainin' Goku and making him in the first place. But _you._ "

Chi-Chi turned to face the humans (well, were the Cranes completely human? It probably didn't matter) - Krillin and Yamcha flinched back, their half-buried fear of women coming to the fore. Tenshinhan and Chiaotzu looked back at her without moving, listening but not defiant. Yajirobe...was eating something. But they were all paying attention. It was kind of hard not to.

"Y'all are Goku's _friends._ His son is out there, scared and with no one but that demon for company. Why are you up here just letting it happen?"

Surprisingly, it was Krillin that stepped forward, though he was about as nervous and ashamed looking as anyone could be.

"Chi-Chi...Gohan was the only one who could actually hurt that last Saiyan. These guys are even stronger. I don't like it, but...we need him."

Chi-Chi shook her head.

"We need a little boy to save us?"

Yamcha spoke up next.

"Come on Chi-Chi! Goku was a kid, and he saved the world a few times!"

"Goku was what, fifteen when he fought Piccolo? And eighteen when he fought him next. My little boy is four. Four years old," she was starting to lose her patience, "four! How many times do I hafta say this? Why won't you understand?"

"So what?" And in an unwise move, Yajirobe decided to contribute. "This kid's even stronger than Goku? Great. Less work for the rest of us."

Even though they were already high above any mountain, they could all swore the Lookout got that little bit colder. Ox was pretty sure that his daughter was about to commit a murder, and he was half-inclined to join her - he didn't care who this samurai character thought he was.

Before they could descend on him, a high-pitched voice spoke up and cut through the tension.

"She's right, isn't she Ten?"

Chiaotzu looked up at Tenshinhan, who had all three of his eyes closed in deep thought. When he opened him, they were all three deadly serious and focused.

"Yes. She's right," and the former assassin let out a breath, "if we're going to make a child do our dirty work for us, then we're hardly any better than these Saiyans. No better than Old Crane. I swore I'd be stronger than Goku, strong enough that I wouldn't have to rely on him to save me again - now I'm supposed to pass my responsibilities on to his infant son?" 

Chi-Chi seemed to almost collapse in relief.

"Thank you," she gasped out, briefly robbed of the fury that had kept her going, "will - does that mean you'll...?"

"Yes," Tenshinhan replied, meeting her desperate eyes with his own, "we will help you get your son back." Chiaotzu nodded his assent.

Krillin sighed. "Yeah," he said, "we really couldn't just leave Goku's kid down there all scared. I only met him for a second, but he's too sweet for this - this crap. Sorry." This last bit was directed at Kami, who merely nodded.

"Damn," Yamcha added, "well, when you put it like that - yeah. Let's go save Gohan. I never did get the chance to fight Piccolo, either of 'em. Guess it's time I paid my dues."

They all looked at Yajirobe.

"Whatever."

Chi-Chi clenched a fist, not in anger at this dismissal, but with determination.

"Let's go get my baby back."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one I actually have plans to follow up on. Or turn into a whole thing by itself, who knows.
> 
> I feel like Kami comes off a little badly here, but I wanted to establish Chi-Chi as someone who is both tactless and very angry. She's being unfair to him, not even on purpose, but she's veeeeery upset. If you couldn't tell. Same with all the guys - she doesn't think they're bad people, but she does think that they all need a kick up the backside, because who lets a toddler do their fighting for them? Related note, Ten refers to Gohan as an 'infant' either because he doesn't understand children or because he's Secretly British. You decide. Related note to 'Tenshinhan' - I use whatever names/words/dubisms I feel like. 
> 
> Anyway, go look at 'A Spring Mother and Her Baby Carrot' by unnoun and SSVCloud for moms being badass.
> 
> And if you're an AtLA fan, I just rediscovered 'The Fun and Perky Warrior's Wolf Tail' by Lavanya Six on fanfiction.net, which is essentially what this collection of nonsense wishes it could be.


	5. She Blinded Me With Science

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Started this one before Chapter 3 and got stuck - soooo, more of the same! I was gonna save it for later, but then ended the previous chapter before anything actually...happened. So I felt bad about that. So here is this.

Being the emperor of the known universe, or at the very least the incredibly powerful landlord of most of it, King Cold had certain expectations of how things were done. He could admit that many of these things were what lesser beings would refer to as ‘unreasonable’.

For example, King Cold expected that if a planet were to displease him, directly or indirectly, then it followed that said planet would be destroyed instantly. ‘Instantly’ was a very important word here, because King Cold believed in time management and practicality, even in things that were ostensibly for pleasure – for instance, terrible revenge upon one’s enemies.

However, Cold also believed in pleasing his terrifyingly powerful and somewhat spoiled son. Said heir (and public face of their ah, "aggressive intergalactic real estate business") had a very keen predilection for seeing the faces of those who had displeased him as they struggled and died in agony, despair, etc. It was a tiresome, if understandable, desire that his favoured child was usually a bit better about resisting. But then, Frieza had been going through a bit of a rough patch - mutilation, humiliation, an existential crisis about his previously assured position near the pinnacle of all creation - so some allowances could be made. This entire trip was, after all, mostly about making young Frieza feel better.

So, here stood King Cold, on the dirt of a planet that was for some reason actually _called_ dirt (or something like that), when he would have much preferred to have wiped the whole place from existence while in orbit. He had said as much to his son, but injured pride would not allow for a less personal revenge, and Cold had a weakness for indulging Frieza’s childish whims.

In countless iterations of these events, across a vast and everchanging landscape of time, the dreaded King Cold would deeply, deeply regret not being a sterner parental figure.

He wouldn't know it at first. After all, the brute that had dismantled his precious son had been scanned for. There was no one else on this ball of mud that could scratch them, and even if this so-called 'Super Saiyan' was around, he could hardly take the two of them on.

So King Cold was in no way intimidated by the stranger that had appeared in their midst, no matter their unnoticed arrival, or arrogant demeanour. He was barely even interested.

For their unseen audience though, the appearance of this interloper was an entirely different matter.

* * *

"Uh...Bulma?"

No response.

"Bulma."

Nothing.

"Woman, what the hell is this?"

"Hey, don't talk to her like that!"

"I'll talk to her however I please, Earthling. I don't like repeating myself, woman - "

"Could've fooled me..."

"...what was that?"

"Nothing!"

It was at this point that Bulma - genius inventor, intrepid explorer of Earth and the galaxy at large, arguably one of the smartest people in existence - finally contributed to the 'conversation'.

"Hey, Krillin?"

Krillin gulped, which was actually a pretty normal reaction for him whenever Bulma spoke. Despite being capable of splitting a mountain in half by essentially thinking hard enough, Bulma made the ex-monk incredibly nervous. Especially when she was narrowing her eyes like that - even if it was at the distant, but very familiar, figure in the distance.

"Uh, yeah? Yes?"

Bulma took a moment, considering her words. Even Vegeta wasn't interrupting her.

"Spit it out woman!"

Oh. Never mind.

Bulma snorted at the (admittedly very good-looking) jerk, but she did 'spit it out'.

"Isn't that your ex-girlfriend?"

If the intergalactic invaders hadn't been so focused in one direction, they might have been alerted to their observers by the sounds of multiple foreheads hitting palms and cliff faces, and an outcry of - 

"Bulma, that's _you!"_

* * *

"Hey there, Frieza. Long time no...actually I guess I only saw you from like, a distance? You were this blurry little blob thing. I mean, a very intimidating blurry little blob thing, don't get me wrong. All those huge energy balls, and the screaming and the powering up and whatnot - "

"My son, do you know this strange creature?"

Frieza frowned in concentration. Having killed and/or tortured an incalculable number of people - he had once set a team of accountants to the task for a bit of fun, then killed them all when they failed, which hadn't really made things any easier - he really didn't bother keeping a memory of any but the most exceptional. The odds were, this loud, annoying Earthling was associated with - well, with...the person who he had come here to revenge himself on, who he was most definitely _not_ afraid of.

" - definitely one of the scarier monsters Goku's fought."

Frieza twitched. He swore he could feel gears grinding and wires sparking in his new prosthetics at the mention of that hateful name.

"So," he purred, because there were appearances to think about, "you're one of that monkey's little friends then?"

"Who, Goku?" The female seemed oblivious to Frieza's eye twitching at the name, "yeah, I've known him since he was about...well, not that much shorter than you, I think."

Everyone in the surrounding area fell quiet, processing these unbelievable events, all thinking, with complete incredulity - 

Had this woman just made a _short joke?_

"Kill her."

At once, every soldier began clicking scouters, calibrating how much energy they or their weapons would need to obliterate this complete fool.

They watched as the numbers climbed into a respectable range. Then an uncomfortable range. The numbers kept rising.

Someone gulped, and Frieza used every ounce of his restraint not to vaporise the whole set of fools right there.

When the first scouter cracked, an unfortunate soul made the decision to take a step back, and found their employment terminated by way of complete obliteration.

The other soldiers turned to look at their leader.

"Perhaps I should have been clearer in my instructions - kill this woman, possibly die in the attempt," here Frieza smiled, "or you can try your luck with me instead. Thoughts?"

As one, the soldiers turned and rushed the interloper.

* * *

"Come on guys, I wasn't born yesterday."

"Bulma, it really does, uh, feel like you."

"...how do you know what I _feel_ like Krillin?"

"Wh-what? Your ki! Energy! _That_ feel!"

"Uh-huh. Got awful lonely up in space, right? I put security cameras in my room you know. If I go through those tapes and find out you - "

"Bulma." Bulma was not exactly accustomed to being interrupted, or to not talking when she wanted to, but it was rare for Tenshinhan to pipe up.

She looked into three, always dead-serious eyes.

"It's you. I can see it clearly, as well as perceive your energy. There's something strange about you - the one down there - but it's definitely you."

He directed his attention back down to the clearing, where things had erupted into a chaos even his eyes could hardly make sense of. Bulma considered whether she had ever heard him - 

"It's you."

Or Piccolo.

"Definitely you, woman."

Or Vegeta, whether she had ever heard any of them make an actual _joke_ before.

She looked down.

"The hell?"

* * *

Frieza looked at the death squad his father had hand-picked for this mission, all lying on the ground, moaning pathetically. To a man, they were clutching their heads seemingly trying to remove their scouters, but so agonised by whatever feedback the little machines were giving them that they couldn't even summon that meagre bit of strength.

Then he looked at the strange Earth woman, who had seemingly put them in their collective position while remaining untouched.

"Neat, huh?"

Frieza lifted a hand.

"Frieza, try not to -"

Whatever his father was going to say was lost to the sound of the massive blast he unleashed on the pathetic failures that had somehow wormed their way into his organisation, this infuriating stranger, and the planet's horizon.

The Earth trembled as a light that eclipsed the sun flared on its surface, the heat and force of it tearing into the crust of the planet with its mere presence.

When the glare abated and the dust had settled, there was a deep burning gouge, a distinct lack of disappointing employees- 

\- and the Earthling, completely unaffected.

The woman brushed some dust off her shoulder.

"You really need to get a handle on that -"

A beam of pink light shot towards her from Frieza's fingertip, swiftly fading as it touched her.

"-temper."

Frieza's right eye did something between a twitch of barely restrained rage and a quirk of genuine interest.

What followed was a barrage of beams, each one thinner and sharper than almost anything else in existence.

Each one, produced so rapidly that hardly any of the onlooking crowd could follow them, uselessly disappeared into the woman's body without any fanfare.

"You know what we say the definition of insanity is on my planet?"

Rock cracked underneath Frieza's feet, the only thing anyone saw before he was suddenly across the clearing with a mechanical fist spearing this infuriating woman through her damnable lungs.

Or the empty space where they should have been - Frieza was slightly expecting to be able to see through the earthling following his move, but the perfectly round hole in her torso was distinctly not what he had in mind. Some viscera, cartilage, _blood_. What was going on here?

"Wow, that was - a lot easier than I thought it would be."

Then she exploded into pure, blinding light.

As if from a great distance, Frieza heard the woman laughing.

_"Sorry Tenshinhan."_

Coincidentally, though Frieza would never know this, there was a temporarily blinded three-eyed man not too far away grumbling about 'originality'. 

* * *

King Cold could not sense energy. After all, scouters existed - though he barely bothered to wear one, given that he wasn't terribly involved in the day-to-day 'minutiae' of the family business anymore, and he had minions for that sort of thing regardless.

Even if he could, there was a strange effect around the woman that produced a 'false positive' of an energy signature, so that even unconsciously a person would think she was there.

('Unconscious' energy sensing was rather common, and most people who could manipulate their ki had it to some degree. It was one reason why someone who did not know who King Cold himself was might find him utterly terrifying for reasons they could not quite explain...though they might put it down to him being a massive, horned, demonic-looking figure with a very unnerving smile.)

Someone who _could_ sense energy, albeit to a very, very fine degree, could have told him that the woman was not really there. If they could also surrender the preconceptions that came with sight, they could have also told him that what he was seeing was actually a collection of smaller, mechanical repositories, each carrying a tiny portion of someone's energy. They might have also noted that when this person dissolved into light, the aforementioned swarm of energy seemed to gather and mingle with Frieza's own energy - into which it disappeared, because Frieza was to this woman, or the simulacrum thereof, as a god.

At least, in terms of sheer might.

However, because these tiny machines had been repurposed by one Doctor Bulma (as opposed to the other one, who was trying to regain her sight while trying to work out what exactly was going on) for a very specific set of purposes, the cybernetic repairs that had been enacted on Frieza's person left him uniquely vulnerable in a way that no one could have anticipated. Not unless, of course, they could see the future.

If anyone had been able to tell King Cold all of this, he might not have reacted to the blow he felt as he did. Alas, there was no such person. And Cold was unable to see, and unused to actually feeling it when somebody hit him.

His reaction was only natural. And entirely expected.

After all, King Cold didn't really believe in wasting time. If something threatened him, he destroyed it.

* * *

Bulma had found herself a good distance away from where she had been when the light show had started. Now, considering there had been what sounded like a fairly huge explosion since then, she wasn't too inclined to complain. Still.

"Hey, guys?"

Stoic silence. Why was there so much stoic silence lately with this crowd?

"Guys?"

They looked constipated when they did this. Had anyone told them that? Someone should tell them that.

"Would someone just tell me what's going on already?"

Of the loosely gathered group who were staring off into the distance while 'sensing' what was going on, only Gohan - who not so coincidentally might have been the only one of the fighters to have been raised by his mother - broke off to tell her what was happening.

"Oh, sorry Bulma! Um...we think maybe you tricked them into fighting each other somehow? The other you, I mean."

"Well. If it is me, somehow, then that does sound like a typically brilliant Doctor Bulma move."

Somebody snorted. Whoever it was, they were one of the most powerful beings on the planet, and it was still a really, really bad move.

"Who was that?"

Still a fair distance away from Earth as the spaceship, a supremely confused Son Goku felt something flicker across his muddled senses. It wasn't a great battle power - he had enough of those to deal with, thank you. Feeling anything besides the huge and chaotic powers of Frieza and...another Frieza, doing whatever it was they were doing, was proving challenging even for his recently fine-tuned senses, especially from this distance.

Instead, it was activating another sense of his, one that he rarely listened to but had developed all the same, in the highly survivalist-heavy way that his people tended to develop abilities.

_'Someone just pissed Bulma off. Or Chi-Chi. Or Lunch. Whatever happened to Lunch...?'_

Even in the blackness of space, Goku's ears were ringing in sympathy.

* * *

King Cold could hear someone screaming. That wasn't uncommon for him. Even this state of being unable to perceive virtually anything else aside from the screaming and, oh my, quite a bit of cursing - when you blew someone's legs off, for example, there could be a lot of glare from the energy blast. And sometimes one would have to close their eyes so as to avoid getting any fluids in them. Unless you wanted to cauterise _and_ dismember in one blow, but then you were back to the glare issue.

The screaming was coming from a long way off though. Who or whatever he had just batted away from his magnificent person, it was still close by - he'd heard it smack into the hard ground near him, quite satisfyingly at that. He'd probably killed it in one blow, which, as little as he cared for dirtying his own hands, was something he could still take pride in. Efficiency. Really something he ought to have impressed upon Frieza just a tad more, come to think of it.

Cold's vision cleared.

_'Frieza..'_

King Cold did not think of himself as the emotional sort. One needed to be dispassionate in his particular business. He did not cry out, no. He did not explode either, which some might have expected, even himself. He simply...stared. 

"Wow, I was a real firecracker back in the day."

Cold turned his head to look at the woman, who did not deign to look back at him. She was looking off into the distance, at the source of the screaming, with an expression - if he had been of a mind to describe it - he would have called wistful.

The woman chuckled.

"Yeah, I kept those boys in line all right."

She turned back around, looking past him to the wreck of blood and machinery and flesh.

"You know, that stuff was pretty easy to hijack once I was in there. I'm gonna have to teach your crew how to put up security against that kind of thing. When they're my crew, I mean."

"Oh?" Cold's voice came out flat. His voice had rarely been 'flat' before. Bored, perhaps. Disdainful. Or amused. This feeling, whatever it was, was new to him.

"Mmm. I feel like I over-prepared for a test. And I never prepared for tests as a kid, so, you know. It's kind of annoying."

"Yes. I can see how that might be. Disappointing."

"Tell me about it. Although, I did borrow someone else's tech for it. Pretty nasty guy too. I made a few adjustments, but...is that like cheating, do you think?"

He was going to kill her, obviously. But he was going to be quick about it, despite his own feelings. The whole planet, one blast, done. He'd signal the ship to take off, and he would take what satisfaction he could from the split second of realisation on her face as he turned this upstart ball of dirt into ashes.

...why was the ship already taking off?

Why, furthermore, was he just watching it do so, as if from outside himself?

"Oh, that's my ship now."

Cold looked back at her. If she had smiled, he would have probably blow the whole place up just there. But she was still talking in that casual, matter-of-fact tone in which she had complained of how easy it was to take control of his son's body and force them to try and kill each other.

"Yeah, I snuck on while we were doing this whole...thing," she waved an arm around, "the whole 'killing Frieza thing' has really sold them on me. You're probably just watching me take off with it cause you're grieving or whatever - I'd have more sympathy if you hadn't, you know, meant to destroy everyone and everything I know and love. Had that happen before. Not a fan. Or if your son hadn't killed Krillin. Also had _that_ happen before. Also not a fan. So -"

"It saves me the trouble of sending them off myself."

"Yeah?"

"I'll destroy your little planet," was _grief_ the right word? Interesting. He'd inflicted it on others many a time. Now it gathered around, lending a weight to his already ungodly ki, enough to destroy this miserable planet a dozen times over and more. "I'll catch my ship and you and all the little rats on it. And then I will take. My. Time."

Red and purple and bright and awful like a dying sun, King Cold brought his power forth, a pressure that shook the earth beneath him. The screaming had stopped, and whatever paltry force of would-be heroes had been hiding in those mountains was probably going to come forth, ready to be destroyed before they could even raise against him.

The woman remained unimpressed.

"Uh-huh. Yeeeeah, I actually can't stop you from doing that - you and junior over there playing around was really all that gave me a shot. So, you'll probably get _close._ Because now's the time for the hero to show up," she rolled her eyes, "and he's _always_ late."

Ignoring the babbling fool, Cold raised his hand, ready to bring it down and finally, _finally_ put an end to all this.

A hand gripped his forearm. He couldn't dislodge it.

Cold turned, and found himself staring into pupil-less, pitiless green eyes.

"Have fun!"

Then there was nothing.

* * *

"So...you're Bulma. But not the Bulma over there," Goku pointed to the very confused group just a ways over, "annnnd there's another Bulma in space?"

Bulma giggled, "I missed you. Yeah, that's basically it."

(In space, a group of scientists, pilots and doctors were wondering where exactly this madwoman was taking them)

"Huh," Goku scratched his head, then shrugged. "Okay. So, Androids."

"Or cyborgs. I never really got an answer one way or the other. But yeah. And a heart virus, Son Goku, so you better take that medicine!"

"Okay, okay! Yeesh."

"I'll be really annoyed."

"Yeah."

"So you better take it."

"I got it, I got it."

"Then kill the Androids. Cyborgs."

"They're really strong?"

Bulma sighed.

"Yes Son, they're really really strong. Stronger than Frieza, by a lot."

"Woop!" Goku honestly bounced a little. She wanted to be annoyed at him for taking the whole thing so lightly - and she was still considering just killing Gero herself. But she was glad to see Goku after all these years. Plus, she had other stuff to do.

"I'll check in on you when I'm finished with space, so you better have taken care of it!"

"What're you gonna do in space."

Bulma smiled. It wasn't the kind of smile anyone in this time would be used to seeing on her face. It was a sad smile, yet somehow determined.

"I'm going to find New Namek."

The real Bulma looked out into the stars, past the holographic image of what was probably her best friend, dead to her quite a few years now.

_It's okay, Trunks._

"Alright, uh, people. Buckle up. We've got a long journey ahead of us."

From the deck, Bulma could see a vast expanse of stars, and in that endless tapestry, there was one that had what she needed.

The ship's engines began to warm up for a jump, the crew (still half-convinced this was some sort of test that Frieza had set for fun) tentatively reading out their calculations - 

"Wait!"

Then stopping to look at the impossibly brilliant madwoman that had captured them, who was pinching the bridge of her and screwing her eyes shut.

"No, what am I thinking? Take us back down to the planet. Ugh. I can just use their Dragon Balls to get there instead. Maybe kill Gero myself. Auuuugh! Dumb."

The ship started to turn around.

Bulma could feel her face getting hot, and just for a moment her main concerns - saving her loved ones, reviving her dead son, killing the madman responsible for all this before he could even start - were replaced by one much simpler, humbler worry.

How exactly was she going to play this whole thing off?


	6. Pothole Surprise

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Someone makes an unfortunate and unintentional archaeological excavation

"Are you sure it will be safe here?"

The Attendant smiled pleasantly, as he did almost everything pleasantly. There was a certain emptiness to all the pleasantness that made Shin distinctly uncomfortable - there was something artificial about Angels, he found. He'd much rather have a sour-faced assistant that he could trust than...well, no. In truth, the Supreme Kai already felt desperately alone, and had been pathetically grateful to have a 'loan' of the God of Destruction's assistant, even for something as seemingly simple as this.

"Lord Beerus cleared this area of life some time ago. This planet is only now producing specimens that are evolving even simple tool usage, and it will be some time still before any interest on an intergalactic level develops."

"You think."

"Oh, well," the Angel chuckled, "I can hardly predict the future, I'm afraid. But it is safe to say this planet is extremely isolated, and one of very many planets, besides. Not to be too blunt, Supreme Kai, but if any of the Wizard's apprentices, clones or what-have-you find this planet, it hardly matters where on the planet the cocoon actually is."

Shin had to concede that point.

"And Beerus. Lord Beerus, that is," he would hate himself for saying this, "cannot destroy it?"

The Angel raised an eyebrow.

"My, a God of Creation, advocating the destruction of a developing planet?"

"It would not have to be the whole planet!" Shin protested.

"When you and Lord Beerus have developed a closer working relationship, I fear you will be very embarrassed by that statement," the Angel's eyelids were lowering, hooded, "you will have to learn to think more, well. More! A-hmm-hmm-hmm. Perhaps you should visit the Tree, and acquire yourself a Shinjin attendant of your own. A little help goes a long way, no?"

The Angel held his eyes for moment, and Shin swore there had been centuries that had felt quicker.

"Yes. Perhaps. But - "

"This 'Majin Buu' will keep, Supreme Kai. I'm afraid you have other duties to attend to, and you cannot stand sentry over this planet alone."

Shin nodded. Whis was right, of course. To devote so much time to an event that may never come to pass...his time would be better spent tracking down Bibidi's associates, if he was worried about it, rather than protecting the spot where the monster was buried. Still, he could not shake a feeling of...wrongness, about the exact location of the creature's cocoon. But then, that was ridiculous.

As Whis had said, what difference did it make where _exactly_ on the planet the thing was?

* * *

  
"Kikoho!"

A burst of light, a mass of heat and force.

"Kikoho!"

A burst of life, heavy with the years thrown into it.

"Kikoho!"

A desperate, last-ditch effort, a willingness to sacrifice oneself, to die - just to buy a few more precious moments.

"Kikoho!"

A massive, massive pain in Cell's tail.

"KIKOHO!"

This was insane. It was irrational. Not just that Tenshinhan - a former assassin turned do-gooder defender of humanity - would be killing himself to save a being (a _creature_ ) that would just as soon turn around and wipe him and everything he cared about off the face of the Earth for fun. Not just that this three-eyed, under-powered, mostly human, third-rate warrior thought he could stop _him_ , someone who was now several times more powerful than he'd been when he'd killed Piccolo, who was in turn several times more powerful than Tenshinhan himself.

But that it was _working._

"Kikoho!"

Cell felt himself get slammed back into the dirt, putting yet more depth into the ever-deepening hole in the ground he had found himself confined to. But no, 'slammed' was a kind word, in this context. 'Slammed' implied that he was being hurt, which obviously would have been bad by itself. But it wasn't that. Whenever Cell flew up, sure that the pathetic little human man had finally run out of energy - 

"Kikoho!"

-he would find himself being _pushed_ down. Somehow, this was a greater indignity than if the human could actually hurt him. It was like being casually shoved by an indifferent giant - without any real force behind it, not really damaging - 

"Kikoho!"

But absolutely infuriating.

There had to be something. Could he summon a barrier? No, that would just move him while he was inside the barrier, not really solving his problem. He wanted to find Eighteen. Absorb her. Become complete, sated, all-powerful.

Perfect.

And he wanted it _now_ , damn it. Turning this into an endurance match not only meant waiting for his birthright, letting her fly further and further away, it also meant admitting that there was something to endure. As if he hadn't been humiliated enough, to admit that he could be held up by this non-factor of an opponent would be just too much.

Despite his efforts, in the normal course of events, this is exactly what would happen. Cell would be sufficiently delayed by Tenshinhan's assault that he would have to spend hours searching for his missing component, and if even half of the people following up on Tenshinhan's efforts had displayed an ounce of pragmatism (as that version of Ten would think to himself several times over the years) he would have been successfully stymied, and prevented from putting the world in any further danger.

"Kikoho!"

But in that world, there was a very key difference.

Cell wiped the dirt and debris from his eyes yet again, and saw something game-changing.

"An...egg?"

* * *

Tenshinhan's body was not his biggest fan right now. It was sweating, panting, aching in ways it hadn't since...well, since the last time he'd abused this particular technique and killed himself with it. He had always put himself through extremes in an effort to get stronger - a perhaps unhealthy habit that began when the man who he desired more than anything else to be like (powerful, untouchable, free) would 'train' him by beating him senseless. But this was something else. How he was even still alive, he couldn't understand. He was having the rather strange - for a martial artist, anyway - experience of feeling totally separate from his body, more so even than when he'd been dead, and technically riding around in a brand new one (was this still his body? That scar Tao had left on him - but no, that had been a scar on his soul).

He was thinking about his time in the Otherworld a lot. Probably because he was going to be there quite soon. This next one would do it, perhaps. When Cell flew out of that hole next, the next blast would probably be his last. But then, he'd thought that about the last...how many had there been now? It hurt so much, there was no way he could put numbers to it. There was nothing in his head except pain, and death, and stalling this monster for just one more minute. Just one more.

He was coming up now, again. Tenshinhan gathered his life force once more. 

Then he squinted.

"An egg?"

The egg came flying out of the hole, and here is where Ten's three eyes and keen senses came in handy. He could see the big, strange rock, and he could also see Cell flying behind it, clearly not too well-informed as to where his opponent's field of vision began and ended. He was expecting Ten to wait, dodge, or perhaps kick the rock out of the way.

Instead, Tenshinhan shifted very slightly, using instincts developed not just by martial arts, but also by several intense games of volleyball.

"Kikoho!"

If the rock, as Cell seemed to believe, was sturdy enough to withstand his technique, it would be blasted back into Cell with force. Which would be both strategically and personally satisfying. If not...it was a rock.

What exactly was Cell expecting here?

* * *

Cell hadn't known what he'd expected. Well, he'd expected the weird egg/rock to be _some_ kind of distraction, at least. And it was tough, as evidenced by the fact that it had been unscathed by Tenshinhan's blasts, so maybe if it had hit the three-eyed nuisance it might have done some damage. Which would have been both tactically and personally satisfying.

He had not expected to be taking that rock to his newly-developed nose.

Reflex kicked in, and Cell kicked the rock back with both feet, flying off in a direction he wasn't entirely sure was up or down, and there was another burst of light.

"Kikoho!"

He hated that word. Cell braced himself for impact, ready for the surprisingly sturdy rock to hit him once more.

Something smacked him in the face yet again. But he was only moved a few feet, and he saw merely a part of the strange rock he'd kicked.

Cell looked up to try and find - then kill - the man that had so thoroughly ruined a perfect day. But his vision was obscured by the strange pink mist in the sky. So he reached out with his other senses for Tenshinhan's energy, only to find a vast expanse of...nothing.

A shiver ran through the android's body, and he decided that none of this mattered - he had to find Eighteen, and could come back and finish this weakling off when he had achieved perfection. Yes, that was it. He just had more pressing matters to attend to.

He wasn't leaving because he was afraid.

That would be ridiculous.

* * *

_Hungry._

The pangs in his stomach were as constant as the beating of his abused heart

_Hungry._

He needed to breathe. He needed air, needed water, needed - 

_Food!_

Last time he'd done this to himself, his vision had gone black at the edges, now it was - 

_Pink! Pink, sweet, candy. Candy! Candycandycandycandy -_

How strange. He didn't even like - 

_CANDY_

He needed more air. His body demanded it, craved it, was greedily - 

_So hungry_

\- gulping it down, but the air felt heavy and strange and sticky - 

_Like candy!_

How was he even still in the air? He was dead, surely? He had to be.

_So weak. So hungry._

There was no way he could have survived. Yes, he could feel his body floating away, feel it dissolving - 

_Boo!_

What?

_Buu!_

What was - 

_BUUUUUUU!_

* * *

Chaozu was flying as fast as he could - and while he might not have had the sheer power of some of his comrades, he had years of experience of near-constantly flying, and a desperate desire to see what was going on. He knew Ten didn't want him anywhere near the battlefield. Knew that he was, to be brutally honest, more likely to be a distraction than any help. But aside from the fact that Ten had been painfully dying for the last little while, what was happening with his energy now was too strange to ignore.

'Strange' was about the best description Chaozu, or anyone at Kame House, was able to manage. In some ways, it almost seemed like Ten was being healed, but his energy was being somehow smothered as well as boosted, and what he was being smothered with was another matter entirely. This wasn't like when a senzu bean healed someone. It was almost more like when Ten divided himself and then reformed, or more worryingly, like what that Cell creature had been doing to various towns and cities. The presence that was entwining with Ten's wasn't so much another energy as it was a vague feeling, and it was impossible to tell whether that was because it was too weak to be felt or too massive to be comprehended, or just too weird and alien to fully understand.

Chaozu spotted his friend from a distance, and his instinct that something had gone wrong seemed to confirm itself.

Why was he _pink?_

* * *

_Why am I pink?_

That was a strange thought. Had he ever been anything _but_ pink? Hmmm. He had always looked strange, somehow. So the pinkness must have been it. Yes, that seemed a satisfactory answer.

"Ten?"

The small, high voice made him turn around. There was a little doll with red cheeks and an odd (even) number of eyes floating in the air. Was that strange? He considered the situation for a moment. No, this was completely normal. In fact, he knew what this little doll was called.

"Chiao - chao - ousha..."

The little doll was getting worried. He didn't like that, for some reason. It prompted the name.

"Chaozu."

The little doll - Chaozu - nodded.

"Are you...okay?"

What a good question. Was he okay? He felt better than he had before, certainly. How had he felt before?

_Dark, cold, need light, warmth, candy, need -_

_Going to die, going to die, have to stop him, stall him, going to die, hurtshurtshurts, need more, more power, need -_

"Nnnn..."

"Ten!"

He bent double, clutching his stomach. The sudden pang of need made him close his eyes, vainly trying to wish the pain away.

"Hungry..."

* * *

"Okay, okay. We'll get you back to Kame House and - and..."

Ten hadn't closed his third eye when he'd bent over. This was common enough that Chaozu hadn't thought anything of it - if anything, it was a common enough habit for Ten that it was kind of reassuring to see, what with all the other physical changes his friend had undergone.

Then the eye _changed_. The sclera turned jet black, the iris a blood red, and there was a flash of pink light.

* * *

There was a smell. A nice smell.

He opened his eyes. The doll was gone.

"Chaozu?"

In Chaozu's place was a bowl of dumplings, fresh and steaming, floating in the air. They smelled incredible.

He forgot about everything else but the food, grabbing it, devouring it, ignoring any decorum in favour of upending the bowl into his mouth, barely chewing. Then he ate the bowl. Which wasn't as nice as the dumplings, to be honest, but had a pleasant sort of crunchiness to it.

"Uh, Tenshinhan?"

That was a new voice. There was a familiar looking man in orange who had just appeared out of nowhere. His hair was everywhere.

"Ten-shin-han."

What was that?

"Uh, that is you, right?"

Oh. That was him, yes.

"Yes. Ten-shin-han. I'm Ten-shin-han."

"Uh, right. You look a little different."

"Different?" Tenshinhan looked down at himself. His skin was still pink. He still had little holes in his arms to let out steam. He felt his ears to confirm that they were still perfectly round, as they should be. What was different about him?

"Ah," he finally realised, "I am wearing different clothes."

Goku - that's who this was, the monkey boy from the tournament - scratched the back of his head.

"Uh, I meant more that you're all weird lookin'. Well, weirder. But yeah, the clothes are new, I guess."

Goku was strange. Had he always been strange?

_Yes._

"Hey, what happened to Chaozu? I sensed him sorta disappear. But not die? I dunno. And you were gonna die - that was kinda dumb, using Kikoho that much, you know."

"Chaozu's gone."

"Gone?"

"Yes. He left." That was right. He had left some dumplings behind him, but he'd left.

"It kinda still feels like he's here though. Like a little bit. Can you find him?"

"I want more food."

"Heh, I get that. But maybe we find Chaozu and - oh, Piccolo!"

"Piccolo?"

But Goku was already gone, flying down to the shore for some reason. Why would anybody want to be on that island? He'd been there for millions of years, it was terrible. And who was Piccolo?

_Piccolo. Piccolo._

_Demon King Piccolo._

That sounded right. A 'demon king'. Huh. Tenshinhan looked down, his three eyes focused on Goku as he brought some green man out of the water.

_Green man. Piccolo. Demon King. He fought. He killed._

"He killed Chaozu."

Unknown to himself, Ten's eyes shifted colours.

"You killed Chaozu!"

* * *

Goku was just putting Piccolo (was it still Piccolo? Were they not going to give Kamiccolo a shot after all?) on his back, when this new Pink Tenshinhan's power skyrocketed to an unbelievable level. Goku's head jerked up in shock, and his vision was filled with pink and red and black. As the island disintegrated, his ears filled with the sound of Tenshinhan's screaming. 

* * *

The island was gone. Piccolo was gone. This pleased him. Goku being gone made him feel a bit more conflicted. He liked Goku, didn't he? But Goku had killed Taopaipai. That was a good/bad thing. Huh. Goku killing Master Tao was good/bad. Wait, but then Goku hadn't killed him. Which was good/bad, because Master Tao was bad/good. This was confusing. What was also confusing was why Yamcha had stopped flying over. Yamcha was his friend, of course. Tenshinhan had broken his leg, that was how they had become friends.

...this was all very confusing.

But yes, from what he could sense, Yamcha had been flying in this direction, but had been stopping and starting the whole way over, having settled on 'stop' when Tenshinhan had killed Piccolo and that nasty island. From the feel of his energy, even Yamcha himself didn't understand what he was doing. Ten scanned the horizon, seeing the other man's figure in the distance.

He should say hi.

* * *

Yamcha had been having a pretty stuttered flight over here. He could admit to himself that a large part of it was fear, but it mainly felt like confusion. The Master had tried to convince him not to go after Chaozu, but he had already been sitting by while one friend died, and however temporary that death might have turned out to be, it still didn't sit right with him. So he'd flown after the little guy, and slowed down a bit on the way when it felt like all that was happening was a conversation. Then Chaozu had disappeared, but only kind of. It didn't feel like he'd died, exactly, but certainly his energy had taken a weird turn, like he'd suddenly decided to hide it. Or as if it had become a part of whatever was going on with Tenshinhan, which was a whole other thing he didn't understand. He'd started flying over to see what was going on. Then Goku was there, suddenly. Then Piccolo popped back up, weakened but still alive (how durable was that guy?). 

Then Tenshinhan had _lost it_.

The ki Yamcha had sensed then was like nothing else he had ever felt. It was everywhere, wild and poisonous and strong enough that it had nearly knocked him out of the sky. He'd stopped, panting for breath, trying to regain his sense of where the world was, because for that brief second all of existence had been nothing but that vile mix of Tenshinhan and Chaozu and whatever the Hell had happened to them.

Then the man himself was in front of him.

Or at least it was something with the same shape. There was a trail of pink behind him that seemed to be an after-image for a second, until it became clear that this thing's body was catching up to it, the rubbery substance joining up with the main body to gain an even more Tenshinhan-like form. In the respect of muscles and facial features and number of eyes, it resembled the man he knew. But the skin was pink, and unmarred except for holes on the arms and chest and in a sort of crown-shape around the third eye. Speaking of eyes, this new creature's three were a threatening mixture of red iris on solid black. The ears were just round holes in the sides of the head. Even the clothes had changed a bit - a white Gi, black boots and bracers lined with gold, and a belt with a large, stylised 'M' on its gold buckle.

...huh, living in the city had made him a lot more fashion-conscious than he'd realised.

"Yamcha."

That was Tenshinhan's voice, at least.

"Um. Yeah. Tenshinhan?"

The thing nodded.

"You have scars now."

Yamcha's hand went to his scars. He'd had them for years - Hell, at this point, he'd had them for the majority of the time Tenshinhan had known him, so to hear the man's voice questioning them was just another layer of bizarre.

This 'new' Tenshinhan looked down at his chest.

"I have...a scar."

Right in front of him, Tenshinhan's old scar began to take shape, or at least a copy of it did. The pink rubber reshaped itself to accommodate the old wound.

"O..kaaaay."

The Pink Tenshinhan looked up at him, those eyes boring into him.

"I'm hungry."

"Okay. Okay. Let's get you some food, huh buddy?"

"Yes," the creature agreed, as its third eye began to flash with pink light, "let's."

The pink beam lashed out, too close and too fast for Yamcha to have any chance of dodging.

Yamcha, however, was not a teleporting Saiyan. A teleporting Saiyan that seemed really, really put out.

"You're not Tenshinhan."

Tenshinhan frowned.

"Yes I am."

"I've gottta agree with Goku on this one," Yamcha chimed in, clutching his chest and reflecting on his life yet again,"Tenshinhan isn't some murderous pink freak."

Tenshinhan - which was _who he was_ \- clenched his fists. The Saiyan's own fists were clenched to match, his whole form flickering gold.

"Yamcha."

"Right," reluctantly, Yamcha made to leave.

"No," Ten protested, "I'm still hungry!"

Why couldn't they understand that?

In a flash of light, Goku transformed, radiating deadly golden power.

_Super Saiyan._

"Saiyan. Super Saiyan."

That was a serious look on Goku's face. It was almost like they were going to fight.

"Ka. Me -"

Oh.

"Ha. Meeee."

He knew how to handle this. Ten clasped his hands together, index fingers up, and focused.

"HAAAAAA!"

Ten roared, his kiai bending the mighty blue beam in front of him, and holding it in place. Steam poured out of his body as he screamed.

Goku had seen the move before, of course, during the 22nd Tournament. He'd seen how Yamcha's Kamehameha wave had been bounced back at him, and so he started bending the beam around the kiai, bringing it round to strike his enemy in the back.

More steam poured forth, and then a wave of energy in every direction, sending the beam and Goku flying away.

Recovering, Goku updated his assessment of the Pink Tenshinhan.

_That was Piccolo's move, from when we fought first. Tenshinhan saw it, so he knew it, but he never used it that I saw - not great for just one opponent, lots of ki, hard on the body even for Ten's style. But this guy knows it. And his energy hasn't gone down at all..._

"Dodon!"

Goku dodged the thin blast, feeling the heat of it even as he avoided it. It, and the twenty that followed in quick succession, streams of pink-yellow light filling the sky.

_Knows every move Tenshinhan does. An' this is how Chaozu fires his Dodonpa, right, all of em at once?_

Placing two fingers on his forehead, Goku teleported behind his opponent, lashing out with a kick to the side of the head. 'Tenshinhan' stopped firing, which was understandable given that the side of his head had just caved in.

Goku watched as the creature refused to fall, then 'Tenshinhan' put a thumb in his mouth, blew real hard, and the side of his head popped back into perfect shape.

Goku blinked.

"Really?"

Hands came together in a familiar pyramid shape.

"Whoa!"

"KIKOHO!"

And so it began.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gonna tentatively put an 'OC' tag in here, both for this BuuShinhan amalgamation and for the ZombieCellTrunks earlier.
> 
> No, this isn't how Buu works, but I've decided that, minus the energy used to revive him in the main timeline, and also because I said so, this is how this plays out. 
> 
> Hopefully I've made correct references to past events here, I wanted some classic DB nods to go with how this new creature tries to sort through Ten's memories.  
> To use a very nerdy comparison, it's a bit like how Rogue had bits Carol Danvers' memory and powers for a long while in Marvel comics, and how Carol got her memories back only to no longer have the proper emotional connections to them.  
> But anyway, this guy has Ten's memories, but doesn't entirely get the context of them, or how they're supposed to be arranged. Hope that came through.
> 
> Right. Right. Whoof.

**Author's Note:**

> I apologise for the poor title(s).  
> I'm gonna post some Dragon Ball what-ifs here when/if inspiration strikes. They might become their own things in the future.


End file.
